Margaret Clarke is the professional lead for school nursing in Leicestershire, UK. Margaret has been made a Queen’s Nurse for her outstanding contribution to local and national school nursing practice.
Margaret developed innovative ways of working, which included an award-winning text messaging system for young people and trialling a virtual Skype clinic to enable children in very rural settings to talk to a school nurse.
As a Queen’s Nurse, she will link into a national network and a regional group for local learning and development.
This title was given to you by the Queen’s Nursing Institute, a community nursing charity. How will this role help you in your work?
I am passionate and committed to my role as professional lead for the School Nursing team and feel honoured to become a Queen’s Nurse. I believe this role will further enable me to raise the standards of care given to local children and young people and to influence the development of national School Nursing practice.
Are you looking forward to joining other Queen’s Nurses?
I am looking forward to joining the QN community of like-minded, professional and skilled nurses. I feel that this support will enable me to continue to introduce innovative ways of working in our community and neighbourhoods to improve the health and wellbeing of our children and young people.
How does life as an Australian School Nurse compare? Would you like to share what a day in your life as a School Nurse is like?
How do you go about helping improve the health and wellbeing of students? What’s your biggest challenge? What support do you need to do a better job as a School Nurse?
We’re creating a new feature that recognises and celebrates the good work of School Nurses around Australia. Each month we’d like to interview a dedicated School Nurse.
Ideally the questions and answers will reveal some unexpected insights that will encourage greater communication and benefit other School Nurses.
If you’re interested, please email help@studentfirstaid.com.au to arrange a quick and easy phone interview.